


The Tender Alcoves Built By Love At Night

by jenstraflintlocked



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-29
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-02 08:55:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 9,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16783741
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jenstraflintlocked/pseuds/jenstraflintlocked
Summary: What did Yaz, Ryan and The Doctor do in that alcove all that time?A-ight this is now a series of drabbles of Adventures In Tight Spaces ft. 13 and YzShout out to Discord chat.





	1. The Tender Alcoves Built By Love At Night

“And so it ended up drowning in the lake and Agatha Christie ended up with amnesia.” The Doctor finished. “Sad really. I like wasps.”

“Great.” Yaz stood on the balls of her feet, trying to prevent cramp in her leg.

“You alright Yaz?” The Doctor asked when it was clear this strategy wasn’t going to work.

Yaz leaned against the back of the alcove and slid all the way to the floor. “Just got cramp.”

Ryan soon followed her, stretching his legs out beside hers.

“Oi! Where’m I meant to sit then?”

Ryan looked at Yaz and grinned, raising his eyebrows. She kicked him in the thigh with the non-cramping leg as she massaged her calf. The Doctor noticed the action and crouched down immediately.

“Stood up too long?” she made a sympathetic face. “Here. Let me.”

“What?” Yaz’s eyes widened as the Doctor laid her hands on her leg.

“Don’t worry! I’ve trained with some of the best masseuses in the galaxy. There’s this little sect on the planet of Gavron 4 that train themselves to be able to send out little electrical pulses, so their fingers vibrate as they’re doing it. Great physiotherapists.”

Yaz stared fixedly at the wall, her mind contemplating all the possible uses of vibrating fingers, ignoring Ryan who was silently cracking up.

“Any better?” the Doctor asked, giving one last expert rub.

“Yeah!” Yaz’s voice had gone a slightly higher pitch. “S’great thanks.”

“Budge over a bit then.” The Doctor squeezed herself in next to Yaz, their legs pressed against each other. “Got enough room Ryan?” she asked.

“Yeah I’m great thanks.”

“This reminds me of the time me and Martha had to share a bed when we were visiting Shakespeare. Very cosy eh?”

“Yeah.” Ryan nodded slowly. “Cosy.”

“Shakespeare was definitely bisexual by the way. He tried to chat up both me and Martha.”

“How does that make him bi?” Yaz asked.

“Well that was when I were still a bloke.”

“Oh.” Yaz spent a brief moment wondering what the Doctor looked like as a bloke.

“Anyway, there were these witches, well they weren’t really witches, they were Carrionites…”

\--------------------------------------------

“Look at us three. Hidin’ in a closet.” Ryan broke the silence that had fallen after the Doctor’s 17th story of her past travels.

“It’s a panelled alcove Ryan.” The Doctor corrected. She’d ended up slouched down as far as she could and was entertaining herself by gently pinging on her braces.

“D’you reckon he’s gone yet?” Ryan jerked a thumb towards the door.

“I’ll just check.” The Doctor shuffled herself back up, flipped onto her hands and knees, straddling Yaz, apologising as she accidentally put her hand on top of Yaz’s. She found a spare bit of floor by Yaz’s thigh to put it and shifted her weight onto it, so she could slide the door with her other hand. “Just be a mo’.”

Yaz folded her arms, then unfolded them then put her hands very decidedly in her lap. Ryan rolled his eyes at her.

The Doctor carefully slid the door back an inch. “Ughh! He’s dedicated I’ll give him that.” She hissed, sliding it back, carefully manoeuvring herself back to the other side of Yaz. “Have I told you about…”

“Ey Doc, no offence but can we stop with the stories?” Ryan held up a hand to stop her.

“Yeah, you’re makin’ us jealous. All these great adventures and we’re stuck in here.” Yaz gestured to the cramped environs they were currently in.

“Excuse me. How is this not a great adventure? We are _living_.” The Doctor reminded them.

“You might be, I’m dyin’ of boredom.” Yaz grumbled, sliding even further down the wall.

“We could play I Spy?”

“No.” Ryan and Yaz said simultaneously.

The Doctor scrunched her face up, disappointed.

Silence reigned for a while, punctuated only by the sounds of the Doctor fiddling with her zip, tapping her boots together and when all else failed, making popping noises.

“Doctor! You doin’ it again.” Ryan sighed.

“Sorry! Sorry. I don’t do linear progression of time. Usually.” She looked at Yaz who was twiddling with a strand of hair. “Ooh! Can I braid your hair?”

“I’m alright thanks Doctor.”

“Need another massage?”

“I’m good.”

“I could read your palm?”

“Yaz, just give in mate.” Ryan pleaded.

“Fine.” Her hands were shaking she was sure of it, as she held out her right hand for the Doctor to peruse.

The Doctor held her hand in one and traced the lines on her palm with the forefinger of the other. She leaned close, close enough for Yaz to feel the Doctor’s warm breath. The hairs on her arm stood on end.

“What does it say then?” she asked, after a few more minutes of enjoying the Doctor’s closeness.

“It says you will meet a fair-haired stranger who will whisk you away on many magical and exciting adventures, up to and including, hiding in hidden alcoves.”

Yaz cracked up. “That’s the _past_ Doctor.”

“So? I’m a time traveller, it can all get a bit confusin’ for me. And thank you for finally agreeing with me.”

“About what?”

“Many magical and exciting adventures.”

Yaz’s mouth dropped open. “I wasn’t saying we didn’t go on them, I was just saying this isn’t currently very exciting.” Although, Yaz reflected, the Doctor hadn’t yet let go of her hand. She’d migrated from line tracing into stretching Yaz’s fingers out flat. Then she lifted Yaz’s hand into the air. Finally, she pressed her own up against it for comparison.

“You’ve got really tiny hands.” The Doctor remarked, staring at their two hands, pressed palm to palm.

“That’s like Shakespeare too, that is.” Ryan grinned at them.

“What is? Tiny hands?” Yaz was not impressed. The Doctor looked at him confused.

“No! That.” He gestured to where their two hands were still up in the air.

The Doctor returned her gaze to the image, contemplating it with a small puzzled frown. Yaz cottoned on first and looked at Ryan in panic. He shrugged, folding his arms and waiting for the Doctor to get it with a grin on his face.

“Oh!” The Doctor said softly.

It was the first time Yaz had seen her blush, not much, just a small flush spreading across her cheeks, reaching to her ears, which went suddenly bright red. The Doctor’s hand slipped slightly, and her fingers moved between Yaz’s.

_And now we’re holding hands._ Yaz barely dared to breath but the Doctor seemed more wondering than perturbed.

“This is nice.” She grinned suddenly, clasping Yaz’s hand. “I like this.”

“It’s not going to be very comfortable for long though, leaning over like that.” _Why…why did she feel the need to point that out?_ Yaz berated herself.

“No worries.” The Doctor swung her leg over and plopped down into Yaz’s lap, grinning at the young woman and completely flustering her.

“Get off! You’re heavy!”

“Can’t. Sorry.” The Doctor made a face, akin to a polite cat.

“What?! Why not?”

“You’re still holding my hand.”

Yaz looked down and realised this was completely true. “Sorry.” She was slow to release.

“Thank you.” The Doctor rocked back into a crouching position. “Oi! Ryan. Move yer legs.”

“Can’t. I’ve got mad cramp from havin’ ‘em crossed so long I need to stretch ‘em out.” He’d spread them out into the space the Doctor had been sitting in.

“Sorry Yaz. Goin’ to need to use your lap again.” That was all the warning Yaz got before once more she had a Timelord sitting on her. “Hello Ryan.” The Doctor waved.

Yaz was unsure whether to thank him or cuss him out as she gave in and rested her head against the Doctor’s back, breathing in that wonderful variety of aromas, mixed with a slightly discordant fluorescent jacket smell on top. Her hands settled for resting on the Doctor’s hips.

“Comfy?” the Doctor asked, feeling these small pressures.

“Not really.”

“Bet you’re not bored now.” Ryan pointed out. 

“Shh!” The Doctor suddenly held up her hand.

There was the sound of a door brushing softly against a carpet, footsteps passed their hiding place and faded away.

The Doctor waited until silence reigned once more, before scrambling off Yaz and pushing back the alcove door.

“Uh! Yaz.” Ryan whispered as Yaz went to follow her.

“What is it Ryan?” Yaz was not in the mood for any further ruses from her friend.

“I really did have mad cramp. Can you give us a hand up?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Shakespeare thing is of course Romeo and Juliet "And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss."
> 
> The title is from "In Common" by Philip José Farmer
> 
> If peeps like I might make a series of Yaz and the Doctor inside a variety of cupboards and other such enclosed spaces


	2. The Oubliette

So far, this trip was not going well. Sometimes they didn’t, but Yaz rated being captured on an alien planet, sedated and flung into a very deep and muddy pit was up there with Ptings. The damp mud was already seeping through her jeans as she sat on the floor, but she’d already tried standing up and it had ended in undignified flailing and getting even muddier. Plus, the Doctor hadn’t yet woken up and was at risk of drowning in the sludge. Yaz heaved the Timelord into her lap and sat with her arms looped underneath the Doctor’s, keeping her upright. Their only hope, as she could see it, was Ryan and Graham and a very, very long rope ladder. She stared at the circle of light above. The pit was in a field and the light, filtering through the leaves of the crops, was tinted a strange deep pink.

“You’re getting heavy.” Yaz sighed, hoiking the Doctor up again. The mud made everything slippery. “And your coat’s ruined. You’re gonna be really upset about that when you wake up. Hope the TARDIS has some dry-cleaning room. Not that my clothes are much better.” Even through her leather jacket she could feel the chill creeping in from the pit walls. “You know what this is, Doctor? It’s an oubliette. We did this poem at school. They used to throw people in pits like these, put a grate over them, and then forget all about them, left ‘em to starve to death. This poem, it were saying memories are like that. That we put memories in pits and forget about them. Only memories don’t really die. So, they’re still there, waiting for us to fall in the pit with them and remember them again. Bit grim really. How do you get out the pit again? How do we get out of this one?” Yaz trailed off from her monologue. She’d been hoping the sound of her voice would bring the Doctor around, but the blonde-haired woman was still a dead weight in her arms.

“What the hell did they shoot you with?” She muttered. “And why did it affect you worse than me?? You’re meant to be a Timelord aren’t you? Surely you’ve got super alien defences. More than a human at any rate.”

Yaz slipped further down the wall, struggling to find purchase again in the mud, scrabbling with the heels of her trainers. “Come on Ryan. Graham. Where’ve you got to?”

\------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Mate, are you sure about this?” Ryan asked Graham. They were hiding in the TARDIS, avoiding the tramping aliens that had taken Yaz and the Doctor.

“Well unless you know how to fly this thing, neither of us are going anywhere else without the Doctor.” Graham pointed out.

“But we don’t know where they’ve taken ‘em. We could end up gettin’ captured too and then big use we’d be.”

“Didn’t the Doctor boost your phone or something? That it could find Yaz’s and she could find yours? After that planet with the mines?”

“Oh yeah.” Ryan grinned at the memory. “They were mining fat and treacle and Yaz got stuck in a cart that went off the rails. Took her ages to get that out her hair.”

“So!” Graham gestured for him to get on with it.

Ryan hastily pulled out his phone and keyed the app, still grinning at another memory of the Doctor tapping hastily on his phone and saying “Need to find Yaz? There’s an app for that.” He’d been so relieved she hadn’t wiped his phone again that he’d forgotten about what the Doctor had created. He still wasn’t sure how she’d got Google maps to work on alien planets though. “Okay…so it looks like they’re about…ten miles that way.” He pointed towards distant hills surrounded by what looked like pink wheat.

“Ten miles. Brilliant.” Graham muttered.

“Oi. You were the one that wanted to go rescue ‘em…Grandad.”

“Gimme ten minutes, I’ll just make a sandwich.”

“One for us too!” Ryan called after him. “And for the Doctor and Yaz. Prob’ly starving as well.”

Graham waved in acknowledgement.

Twenty minutes later, fully stocked with two marmite sandwiches and two cheese and pickle, they set off towards the small, meeping purple dot on Ryan’s screen.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Y’know, I won’t ever forget this. Even if this is it, I die, alone with you in some hole in the ground. I wouldn’t take any of it back. Seeing it all was just far too brilliant. That’s what I’m remembering now, taking me mind off this. All the good bits. Seein’ Rosa Parks, seein’ an alien planet, seeing me nan. I was so worried when they took you. Just disappeared off for hours. There was me wondering how we were gonna get home without you. I mean you’ve taught me some TARDIS controls, but I’d never be able to fly it. But more than even that, I was just wondering if you were dead, if you’d been assassinated. If they’d come for you. And it’d be my fault. Cos I was the one who insisted on staying. I was the one who’d insisted on going in the first place.” Yaz hugged the Doctor tighter to her. “But you didn’t, and we got out. And so did my nan. I think she knew after that, y’know. When I showed her the patterns on my hands, I think she recognised them. She was happy to tell me about it after seeing them patterns, but I didn’t want to hear. She’d be describing us! Me and you and Ryan and Graham. Far too weird. I mean you married her!” Yaz laughed. “All your ‘don’t interfere’ speeches go out the window pretty quick it seems. Not that I was really paying attention to them either. I wonder what my nan thinks? ‘My granddaughter’s a time traveller.’ She must know. I didn’t even come up with a fake name. Imagine if she thought about Yaz all those years and then when me mum had me, my nan was just like ‘name her after this lady who helped me, back in Pakistan, call her Yasmin.’ What if I caused myself to be named my name? That’s weird. All…wobbly and looped. I didn’t interfere myself out of existence, I interfered myself into existence. Can’t imagine not being Yaz. If I wasn’t Yaz, you couldn’t call me Yaz. I think…I think we’d still be friends though, even if I wasn’t Yaz. I think I’d still be the same person. I’d still come travelling with you, keeping you company. You wanted us to stay with you, didn’t you? When you looked at me, you looked so alone. I couldn’t let you go off like that. Bit of a poor cover story, inviting you for tea. But you went for it anyway. Ryan teases me about that. How you just followed me, right off the bat. Like when we were in that alcove, goin’ on about Shakespeare. Honestly, he’s worse than my mum sometimes.” Yaz shook her head and then shook the Doctor. “You gonna wake up any time soon? Before I say something embarrassing?”

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It had taken them nearly three hours to get anywhere near the purple spot. And now they were lost in a large field, of pink wheat that was taller than they were. The air was humid and the light a strange, soft pink. Ryan had nearly lost Graham twice and was contemplating whether or not they should’ve brought rope.

“Does that thing say whether or not we’re close?” Graham asked for the third time.

Ryan swiped and zoomed in. “We should be practically on top of them.” He pushed through the plants and then stepped into nothingness.

“Ryan!!” Graham hastened to follow him at the sound of his scream.

“Get me up! Get me up!!” Ryan was holding tightly onto one of the wheat plants, preventing him from falling into what looked like a very deep pit.

Graham grabbed him by the back of his jacket and hauled. “Up you come, son.”

His breath coming in gasps, Ryan looked back at the hole he’d narrowly escaped falling down. He checked his phone and then looked back at it. “Oh no…” he whispered. “You don’t reckon…”

“RYAN??!” a faint yell sounded from far below them.

Lying flat on his belly, Ryan crawled to the edge and looked over, shining his phone torch into the darkness. “Yaz??”

He nearly fell in again as his phone started ringing. “What the hell?” The caller ID said Yaz. He picked it up.

“I forgot the Doctor gave us long distance calls.”

“Oh my god! Yaz! Are you okay? Is the Doctor with you?”

“Yes and yes but they knocked us out with something and she’s still unconscious.”

“Right. Wait there. We’ll go back to the TARDIS and get some rope or something or…or a ladder. A rope ladder!”

“Oi. You’re not hungry, are you? I’ve brought sandwiches.” Graham leaned over and yelled near Ryan’s ear. He winced away.

“What’ve you got?” Yaz asked.

“Marmite or cheese and pickle.”

“Marmite please.”

“Shall I just throw ‘em down? They’re wrapped in cling film.” Graham glanced into the murk and with a shrug, threw the sandwiches down. It was a good few seconds before they heard a small thwap from Ryan’s phone.

“Caught ‘em! Brilliant toss Graham.”

“Ooh! Is that marmite I smell?”

“Doctor!!” Yaz’s cry of delight made Ryan wince again and hold his phone away from his ear.

“Doctor!” Graham yelled in his other ear.

“Guys…” Ryan whispered to himself.

There was the muffled sound of someone hastily eating sandwich. “Right you two! Small mission. Back to the TARDIS, go out the door from the console room, third room on the left, there should be a rope ladder. Ace brought it back from the ice caverns, I think. Should be long enough, I extended it a bit. And I made it self-retracting. Buzz from the sonic and it should bring us all the way up.”

“In the TARDIS?” Graham sighed.

“Why? Has it been captured?”

“No. Not yet. S’just, it’s about three hours away.” Ryan made a face at Graham.

“Ah. Well…me and Yaz can entertain ourselves for three hours. Can’t we Yaz?”

“Sure.” Came Yaz’s resigned voice.

“Call us again when you’re back.” There was a tone as the call was ended.

“Pass us a sandwich.” Ryan gestured, after he’d carefully gotten back up.

They started the long walk back, busily munching.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Yaz was still holding the Doctor up.

“Am I heavy?” The Doctor asked, remembering Yaz’s complaint the last time she’d been sat in the young woman’s lap.

“Not really.” Yaz hadn’t let go of her grip. “You okay now?”

“Think so. Bit of a head wonk. Strong stuff that. Luckily, excessive salt is just what I needed to kick it out.” The Doctor leaned back against Yaz once more. “Can’t remember the last time I was held like this.” She murmured.

“I didn’t want you slipping into the mud. There’s water comin’ through as well.” Yaz realised, as she pointed it out, that it had gotten deeper.

“Well if all else fails we can float to the top then.” The Doctor eyed it and then stared up towards the far exit. “I fell into a pit once. Well, I say fell, I jumped. Couldn’t resist. I had to know. Even though it meant potentially leaving behind…” the Doctor grimaced. “Well, it all worked out. Defeated the devil, saved everyone. Well, some people. Well a few. Quite a lot of people died really. All the Ood.”

“Ood?” Yaz grinned at such a ridiculous name.

“Slave race. Well, humans made them into one. They’re free now. Donna and I freed them. I met…their shared consciousness. They sang me to my end. I didn’t want to go, you see.” The Doctor fell silent. After a while she piped up again. “Can you sing Yaz?”

“Um. Not…well sort of. I’m okay at karaoke.”

“Karaoke. We’ll have to go to karaoke one time. I bet Graham is an amazin’ singer.” The Doctor laughed.

“I think Ryan would beat us all.”

“Not me. Amazin’ singin’ voice me. Well I used to. Haven’t really sung with this new voice. Oh my stars. Singin’ as a woman. I’ll be all… I’ll be able to sing the top notes! A whole new octave. Brilliant.”

Yaz smiled at the unbelievable woman in her arms.

“Will you sing for me? Pass the time, while we’re waitin’.”

“What would you like me to sing?”

“Your favourite song. One you used to listen to as a kid and just…mess about and dance to.”

Yaz thought for a bit. “Any Which Way. By the Scissors Sisters. But I can’t really sing it properly. His voice is just…”

“Sing it anyway. G’wan.” The Doctor nudged her with an elbow.

Yaz took a moment to remember the lyrics. “uh…dancin’ on the speakers, are you peakin’ with the tweekers? Bigots and the breeders on the scene. The night don’t last forever so get your mm together. Open arms are never what they seem.”

“Get your mm together?”

“Well they bleep it out on the cd but I think it’s meant to be get your sh*t together.”

“Ooh. I don’t like bigots.” The Doctor wrinkled her nose. “Go on. What’s the next verse?”

“Well it ooh’s for a bit and then…” Yaz scanned the next verse in her mind and flushed. “I…I don’t need…” she gulped and had to begin again. “I don’t need a Doctor, just a…a simple love concocter to…er”

“What, you don’t need me?!” The Doctor sat up and stared at Yaz over her shoulder, affronted.

“It’s the lyrics!!” Yaz protested helplessly.

“Not sure I like the Scissor Sisters.” The Doctor grumped.

“They’re cool! They did amazin’ songs. I Don’t Feel Like Dancin’ and I Can’t Decide.”

“Ooh I really don’t like ‘em now. I always feel like dancin’. And I am always very decisive. Who writes a song about not being able to decide? What can’t they make their minds up about that they have to write a whole song about it?”

“Um I can only remember the chorus.” Yaz started singing. “I can’t decide whether you should live or die.”

“Shut up.” The Doctor jerked to her feet, the effect ruined somewhat by her slipping on the mud and falling against the opposite wall. She stood there, leaning against it, staring at the mud.

Yaz had stopped singing immediately. She’d never really heard the Doctor’s voice so cold or so angry. But she was entirely baffled at the Timelord’s reaction. The Doctor had keeled over now, landing on her knees, streaking her face with mud as she held her head in her hands. If Yaz hadn’t known better, she’d have said the Doctor was having a panic attack.

“Ohhh. This is not a good memory. This is NOT a good memory. What did you say before Yaz?”

“Um? About what?”

The Doctor flapped a hand at her. “About the oubliettes. The memories. I’ve…I’ve fallen into a memory. That I’d almost…I tried so hard to forget. Everyone else got to forget. Apart from Martha and her family. And Lucy. Poor Lucy.”

“You heard all that??” Yaz thanked her stars she hadn’t said anything more.

“I need…I need a rope ladder Yaz.” The Doctor’s face, when she turned to look at Yaz, was pale beneath the mud. Her hazel eyes pleaded.

“I don’t…um…I’ve been to the year 3000. Not much has changed but they live underwater…”

“You what?!” The Doctor scrunched her nose up. “No, they don’t. Well unless you count the fishes. They still live underwater. And whales. And loads of things have changed by the year 3000! When did I take you to the year 3000 anyway? I don’t remember that.”

“It’s a song, Doctor.”

“Blimey Yaz. You need a better taste in music. We’re definitely doing karaoke now. Karaoke in the year 3000. Perfect.” The Doctor scrambled back over to Yaz and flopped back down in her lap, somehow managing to get Yaz even muddier than she had been. Which, Yaz reflected, was an achievement. They sat in silence for a bit.

“You okay?”

“Not really.” The Doctor sighed.

“Tell me?”

\---------------

The rope ladder was so long they had to fold it several times and carry it between them like some weird stretcher.

“D’you reckon they’re still okay?”

“Well. They’ve got sandwiches and each other. Sure they’ll be fine.” Graham nodded. They’d finally arrived back at the field of pink wheat and Ryan was once more consulting his phone as to where they were meant to go next.

“What d’you think happened to them aliens? The ones we saw marching all over the place.”

“Prob’ly thought they’d dealt with us lot and could go home for some tea. Like I’m gonna do once we’ve rescued the Doc and Yaz.”

“This way.”

Ryan managed to avoid falling down the pit this time. “Oh. What are we gonna attach it to?”

“Good thing I brought these.” Graham brought a hammer and some long wooden stakes out of his jacket pocket.

“You’re gettin’ worse than the Doctor you are.”

“Well, after your comment about vampires I thought what if there’s space vampires. Gotta be prepared with the Doc.” Graham whacked the stakes into the ground a little way back from the hole, then deftly tied a rope of the ladder round each one. “There we go. Let her loose.”

“Yo Doctor! We’ve got the ladder.” Ryan called down as he rolled it to the edge and then let it drop into the pit.

“Brilliant job you guys!” came the Doctor’s faint reply.

Yaz climbed up a little way onto the ladder, so the Doctor could cling on underneath her.

“Ready Yaz? Hang on!” The Doctor waved her sonic and the rope ladder moved slowly upward. “Watch yer knuckles. I never did really perfect it as a device…”

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A three-hour slog later, through pink wheat whilst avoiding aliens and trying to ignore the sensation of the mud drying on her clothes, and Yaz was more than ready for a quick hot shower, followed by a long hot bath and then a very long period of repose. Hearing about the Master and Martha and a year from hell had shaken her to the core. The fact that the Doctor had trusted her enough to tell her? Even more so.

She hummed to herself as she stepped into the shower and started singing. “I don’t need a doctor, just a simple love concocter…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Relationship Goals: having each other and sandwiches and thusly being fine
> 
> Thanks to Prof D from the discord chat for the perfect song of Any Which Way (I was toying with She's My Man) and the reminder that ooft would Scissor Sisters bring back memories for the Doctor. 
> 
> The poem Yaz is talking about is The Oubliette by I believe Philip Gross. I'll post it on tumblr if anyone wants to read it. Tis beautiful but I can't find it sweet f- anywhere online.


	3. The Priest Hole

They’d been on a tour of what the Doctor had called the stately homes of England. Graham had found it fascinating but Yaz and Ryan had been getting bored until they’d alighted on this house. It’d looked derelict, with large keep out signs on high fences all around it, but the Doctor had ignored those. Along with, Yaz noted, several gangs of neighbourhood teenagers. Graffiti never changed, she thought with a wry smile. They’d been to ancient Rome and seen kids drawing rude things on the walls. The only thing that had changed was the means of drawing them. The locals here had favoured the traditional spray paint, and clearly one of them had been a goth of some description. There was a strange symbol gashed into the bare floor boards and surrounded by burnt out candles. It was a wonder the place hadn’t been set on fire.

Graham was tapping on the walls with his knuckles. Throughout the tour, he’d been diligently checking for secret passages or rooms, having fun with the idea of long-lost treasure and artefacts. Ryan was exploring behind the dusty drapes that were hung on the wall, making them billow and wave, throwing up clouds of dust, making Yaz cough. She ran after the Doctor, whose striding walk had carried her to the end of the corridor.

“Those two having fun?” The Doctor asked, peering up a long flight of steps.

“Sort of.” Yaz brushed dust from her jacket. “Will these take our weight?” she put her foot on the first step.

A deafening wail sounded from all around them, making her crouch, clutching at her ears. “What did I do?”

“Some kind of security system?” The Doctor shouted over the noise. “But what would an abandoned building need with one?” she buzzed the air with her sonic and tracked a signal to the banister. “There!” she flourished the sonic screwdriver and the wailing sound stopped. “That’s better. A security system like that indicates that someone is hiding something, and clearly it’s up here. Pro tip. If you want to hide something, don’t set a massive blaring alarm to go off any time someone goes near it. C’mon Yaz!” The Time Lord grabbed her hand and pulled her up the stairs.

Thankfully the staircase was sturdier than it looked and took their weight. They emerged onto a third-floor landing, all threadbare carpet and lined with suits of armour, holding an array of sharp implements.

“What is this place? Hogwarts?” Yaz asked, wandering further down the hall as the Doctor let go of her hand to examine the armour.

“Nah. It wouldn’t be all hidden and derelict if it was. I’m not a muggle. See? Magic wand.” The Doctor grinned and waved her sonic at Yaz, lighting it up with a touch of her thumb. Her smile wavered as, in unison, with a metal fork on a plate screeching noise, every single helmet on the suits turned in their direction. “They’re all looking at me aren’t they.” The Doctor scrunched her nose up.

“Yep.”

“RUN!” The Doctor pelted after the already fleeing Yaz.

With copious amounts of grinding and clanking, the suits of armour came to life and followed after them. Yaz didn’t bother with any of the doors leading off the hallway but went straight for the small staircase at the other end. Admittedly it went up, not down, and going up would inevitably lead to a dead end or a very long fall, but there was a prospect of a slightly longer life. And luckily, the armour didn’t seem very quick on its feet.

“Up! Up!” The Doctor pushed her onward, when she hesitated on the next floor and they ended up on in a large attic space. It was divided in two by a wall wooden panels, a small archway in the middle of the wall. “Through there!” The Doctor hissed and Yaz crawled through it, trying desperately not to imagine the size of the spiders that might inhabit such a space. She shuddered as the memory of giant spiders insisted on coming back to her. The Doctor followed her and immediately started knocking softly on every floorboard.

“What’re you doin’? This is not time to search for…”

One of the Doctor’s knock returned a hollow echo. She went to sonic the floorboard then cursed. “Still don’t have a wood setting.” She eased her fingers into a barely perceptible gap and started lifting the floorboard up. It came up as a whole section of floor, revealing beneath it a small dark hole. “In! In! Quickly.”

Yaz scrambled in. It wasn’t deep at all, barely three feet high. She led down on the dusty floor and prayed that nothing was about to crawl into her hair. She reached out a hand, trying to gauge how wide the space was and almost immediately hit a wooden wall. This place was _tiny_.

“Mind yourself Yaz!” The Doctor dropped down next to her, reaching back up to pull the section of floor back down. 

“What is this?” Yaz whispered, lying on her side to try and give the Doctor more room, but the Doctor had to lie on her side as well to fit in.

“It’s a priest hole. Back in Elizabeth the first’s day, they didn’t like Catholics very much, prob’ly something to do with Henry, and they’d hunt them down and torture them. Some people were still friendly to the priests and hid them away. But they’d search houses, basically ransacking the place to find them. So people built absolutely tiny places into buildings to hide the priests in, that were virtually undetectable. ‘course some people still got caught. But whether it was a small pub or a large grand house, there’s priest holes still all over the country. ‘Course, if I hadn’t gotten into Elizabeth’s bad books, I could’ve tried to stop her but there you go.”

“How did you get into Elizabeth’s bad books?” Yaz asked curiously, mainly to distract herself from the fact she was lying face to face with the Doctor in darkness. She could feel the Doctor’s breath on her face, her knees pressing gently against Yaz’s.

“Err…I married her and then sort of…disappeared before the wedding night.”

“You married Queen Elizabeth??”

“Shh!”

“And you stood her up on her wedding night.”

“Terrifying suits of armour chasing us Yaz. Not quite the time.” The Doctor pressed a finger to Yaz’s lips.

She froze, half from the sensation and half from the sound of metal scraping against metal and heavy thudding footsteps. She judged there were about three suits, grinning against the Doctor’s finger as she imagined the ungainly things crawling through the arch way.

They clearly managed to because the floorboards near them creaked and strained under the weight. The Doctor tried a surreptitious sonicking of the suits, trying to figure out what they were. The sudden glow and the noise alerted the suits to their presence and Yaz had to bite back a scream as a spear came crashing through the hidden entrance. The Doctor suddenly pressed up tight against her, avoiding the second spear jab as it stabbed the space she’d been lying in, piercing the Doctor’s hood. Yaz barely had time to contemplate that if this was how she was going to die, actually it didn’t seem that bad, before the Doctor rolled onto her back, pulling Yaz on top of her. A third spear jab ripped through the Doctor’s coat sleeve, but she remained silent and still. Yaz breathed through her nose, in an attempt to control her breathing, inhaling the Doctor’s ever-changing scent. Today it was sawdust and fresh bread with a hint of old books. It distracted her momentarily from the fact that things were attempting to murder them. Unthinking, she nuzzled the Doctor’s neck gently, breathing the scent deeper. The Time Lord tensed under her, the arms around her squeezing her tight.

“Not quite the time Yaz.” The Doctor breathed into her ear. Yaz went bright red as she realised what she’d done and jerked upwards, hitting her head hard against the priest hole lid and consequently collapsing back down again. “Oops.” The Doctor winced as the lid was wrenched off its hinges by a suit of armour. She pushed Yaz upright, and they both scrambled out of their hiding place to face their enemy.

A suit of armour swung a spiked mace at them, but the Doctor merely ducked under it, throwing herself into a forward roll and springing up behind it. She sonicked the back of its helmet and it folded in half, before breaking into its composite armour pieces. Another suit of armour tried to grab Yaz from behind, but she grabbed one of its arms and attempted to throw it over her shoulder. All that happened was the arm came away and she staggered forward, crashing into the third suit and smashing it to pieces.

“Don’t think much of these guards.” She huffed, jumping to her feet once more.

“They’re barely animated.” The Doctor sonicked the last one. “Device in the helmet, see?” She lifted it to show Yaz. “Binds it sort of together but it’s not very sophisticated. And, with a bit of tweak…” she pressed the sonic against the small black box. “I can disassemble all of ‘em!”

“Poor Johnny 5.” Yaz inspected the one she’d cannoned into.

“But it still begs the question, what were they protecting? C’mon! Let’s find Ryan and Graham and explore the rest of the house. See if we can’t find it.”

“Doctor!” Yaz grabbed her by the arm.

“What?”

“Your coat.” Yaz couldn’t quite bring herself to say anything else.

“Ohh.” The Doctor gazed at it ruefully. “This coat always gets the worst of times. Ripped up to distract Rosa, covered in mud. And now stabbed by a suit of armour.”

“Will the TARDIS be able to sort it?”

“One of its many talents. A dry cleaner.” The Doctor abandoned her mourning of her coat sleeve and looked at Yaz. “Not that your clothes look much better.” She brushed her hands down Yaz’s jacket sleeves, trying to wipe off the muck from the priest hole. “They have a habit of getting muddy a lot.” She grinned.

“Least there’s no giant alien tendrils.” Yaz shrugged.

“Yet.” The Doctor raised her eyebrows. "How's your head?” She reached out a hand and felt the back of Yaz's head. "Bit of a bump."

"It's fine." Yaz smiled, enjoying the sensation of the Doctor stroking her hair.

"Hm." The Doctor hummed absentmindedly as she brushed a strand of Yaz’s hair behind her ear, before licking her thumb and rubbing some dirt off of Yaz’s cheek.

“Oi!” Yaz laughed. “Don’t worry. I’ll have a bath later.”

“Sorry.” The Doctor swung her arms awkwardly.

“You’re not lookin’ much better.” Yaz looked over the multitudinous smudges on the Doctor’s face. “You’ve got one here,” she brushed a thumb over the Doctor’s eyebrow. “Some here,” she drew a line down the Doctor’s cheek with her finger tip. “And another one there.” She prodded the Doctor on the nose.

“Must look a right mess. This is why mothers always carry wet wipes.” The Doctor sighed. “Might have to join you for that bath later.” she turned to go back down the stairs, missing the picture that was Yaz’s expression. “But first we’ve got to find what the armour was guarding. C’mon!” She noticed Yaz hadn’t moved and held out her hand, waggling it playfully.

Yaz swallowed down her question of when it just might possibly be the time, not to mention baths, and took it.

“Where’ve you two been? You look filthy.” Graham looked up from the mantelpiece he was investigating.

“We had to hide from some animated suits of armour that were trying to stab us. Don’t worry!” The Doctor reassured him as his eyes widened. “Didn’t get us. Only me coat.” She touched the hole and made a sad face.

“Hidin’ in a closet again?” Ryan grinned at Yaz who flashed him a ‘don’t even ask’ expression.

“It was a priest hole, Ryan.” The Doctor corrected him. “Now then gang! Team Tardis I mean. Something valuable is hidden in this house, worth setting up suits of armour to protect it. And we’re gonna find it.”

“Ha! See. I told you.” Graham wagged his finger at them all. “Mark my words, it’s a long lost treasure.”

“Or scary alien artefact.” The Doctor warned him. “Might not make that much money out of it.”

“Well.” Graham shrugged. “It’s still exciting, isn’t it?” He put his hands in his pockets and followed her out into the hallway.

“Not as exciting as hiding in a priest hole with the Doctor tho, I bet.” Ryan whispered to Yaz, giving her a nudge as he walked past her. Rolling her eyes and stifling a groan, she joined the rest of them.


	4. Broom Cupboards and Door Knobs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I have tried this chapter 5 different ways, having originally deleted it, and I still can't get it right XD So I'm posting it anyway so I can move on

“Quick! In here!” The Doctor skidded to a halt, flung open the rather small door and shoved Yaz through, swiftly darting after. She pulled the door to behind her, but didn’t shut it entirely, peering out through the gap into the chapel beyond.

Yaz tried and failed to stand in anything that wasn’t a metal bucket. It clanged against another one. She clutched at a mop to try and prevent herself falling but only succeeded in getting the mop to join her in the pile of cleaning equipment on the floor. A broom waited until the din had faded away and then promptly restarted it by falling over, catching Yaz on her shoulder and making her swear.

“Shh!” The Doctor flapped her hand at Yaz who tried to protest that it had not been her fault, only to get a more violent shushing. Yaz rolled her eyes, grateful at least that she hadn’t tried to grab hold of the shelf and pull that and all its multitudinous boxes down on top of her as well.

“Doctor…” she hissed, after a few minutes passed and there was no sound of further alien activity. “Can I just ask, hiding in a closet, in the houses of parliament? Cos when I said I wanted to see London this is _not_ how I imagined it.”

“Firstly Yaz, it’s a broom cupboard. Sez so on the plaque on the door. Secondly, we’re hiding from an invasion by the Dirklyons, which I may or may not have completely failed in convincing them to stop. And all I need is a little bit more time. Gah! This is worse than when the Slitheen tried to take over. At least then I had Mickey on the outside, ready to blow up the houses of parliament.”

“You did…what? _YOU_ were behind that??”

“Shh!”

Yaz eased herself up, taking care to stack all the buckets and use them to prop the brooms and mop back up against the wall.

“Why is there a plaque on the door of a broom cupboard anyway?”

“Good question Yaz!” The Doctor opened the door again and went out to read it more thoroughly. “Oh! This is amazing.” She popped back in. “There is a plaque because this is not just any broom cupboard Yaz. This is the broom cupboard that Emily Wilding Davison hid in, to avoid the census, so she could claim the Houses of Parliament as her place of residence.” The Doctor looked about her. “It’s nice that they kept it as a broom cupboard.” She went to open the door again, to keep an eye out for any aliens coming near. “Oh.”

“What?”

“Um. It’s fine. You’ve got your mobile, haven’t you? Can make a call?”

“If I can get signal. Why?” Yaz looked at the Doctor’s hand, which was currently holding a door knob. A door knob which was no longer attached to the door. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“Well it’s a very old broom cupboard isn’t it!” The Doctor chucked it to the floor and then chucked herself to the floor. “Why does this always happen every time I don’t have me sonic on me? But Graham and Ryan need it to get into Big Ben.”

Yaz took out her mobile, waving it desperately in the air to try and get signal. “All out of luck I’m afraid.” She sat herself down, more gently, next to the Doctor. “So! Tell me about these Slitheen then.”

\------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“And then we got into a cupboard, not unlike this one, and rode it out.”

Yaz grinned. “I can see why you liked Rose. She sounds awesome.”

The Doctor was silent. It was a silence that expanded from a person and enveloped entire rooms, weighing down on anyone in the vicinity. Yaz felt it and looked at the Doctor, confused initially. She couldn’t see the Timelord’s expression, she’d tilted her head to hide her face behind curtains of hair.

“Oh.” Yaz caught on but didn’t dare give voice to her realisation. _You didn’t just like her did you, Doctor?_

“Ahh. She was fantastic.” The Doctor sighed. “Well, I mean everyone who travels with me is fantastic or brilliant but…”

Yaz smiled sadly. “What am I then?”

“You’re amazing, Yasmin Khan.” The Doctor smiled at her, clasping her hand.

Yaz slumped over, resting her head on the Doctor’s shoulder and staring at the door. “Y’know, all we really need is a small flat bit of metal or something, like a proper screwdriver and we’d be able to hook it on the mechanism, pull it back and open it. That’s how me mum did it, when my sister took her bedroom door handle off as a kid.

The Doctor got up, pulling Yaz up with her and started rifling through large amounts of odds and ends on the shelves. Yaz joined in with her spare hand, the Doctor seemed unwilling to relinquish her other one.

“Aha! Not a screwdriver but! a flat bit of metal.” The Doctor held up a bottle opener.

“What’s a bottle opener doing in a broom cupboard?”

“Believe me, being a cleaner or a caretaker is a _very_ stressful job.” The Doctor finally let go of Yaz’s hand and hooked the bottle opener carefully over the small tab of protruding metal. “Get ready to pull.”

Yaz leant over the Doctor and put her fingers in the small round hole where the handle should’ve been

With a keen of concentration, the Doctor gently pulled the latch out. “Now!”

Yaz gave a tug and the door swung towards them.

“Ha! Teamwork.” The Doctor scrambled up, blocking the door from swinging shut again with her foot. “Yaz and the Doc. Urgh. Never calling myself the Doc again.” She grabbed Yaz’s hand and held it up, so their arms formed a ‘w’. “The Doctor and Yaz, unstoppable together.”

Yaz beamed at her and something about the way the Doctor said ‘together’ made her slide her hand until their hands were pressed against each other palm to palm.

“Holy palmer’s kiss.” The Doctor eyed their hands, remembering a certain panelled alcove.

“My palms like kissing yours.” Yaz said in her defence. “Although, I have been wondering, have not Timelords lips?” She watched the Timelord’s face closely for a reaction. And there it was, that flush that went right across the cheeks and ended up in the ears.

“Aye! Which they must use for talking and convincing aliens to get off this planet. Best get back to it.” The Doctor let her hand her fall away and began striding down the aisle of the chapel, ignoring the beautiful stained-glass windows and the mesmerising patterns they made on the flagstone floor.

“They didn’t do a very good job the first time they tried it.” Yaz pointed out. She’d paused to look at the plaque the Doctor had mentioned, reading it through herself, tracing the letters with her finger, smiling at Tony Benn’s determination as well as Emily Wilding Davison’s. She’d heard of the suffragette and the protest at the derby, but never of her hiding in the broom cupboard tactic.

“Oi! Rude. I so very nearly had them convinced I’ll have you know. Sort of.” The Doctor noticed the lack of Yaz following her and came back to stand beside her, gazing at the plaque.

“May as well let lips do what hands do then, lest faith turn to despair.” Yaz looked over her shoulder, half of her thanking Shakespeare, half of her petrified in case this was pushing things too far. Half in jest, just quoting Shakespeare, half throwing the Doctor an opportunity.

Whatever reaction she’d been hoping for or expecting it was not the look of dismay that graced the Doctor’s face. Fear flooded Yaz as the Timelord stomped off.

“Doctor!” she called after her.

“I’ll sort it out Yaz.” The Doctor snapped. “No need for you to despair _._ ”

Yaz’s brow furrowed. Smartest person she’d ever met but also such an _idiot_ sometimes. “I was quoting Shakespeare. It’s the next line. That’s all.” That brought the Doctor up short, allowing Yaz to catch up with her. “I haven’t lost any faith in you.” She placed her hand on the Doctor’s clenched fist. It opened like a flower at her touch and clasped her hand.

“Then do you trust me to grant your prayer?” The Doctor asked softly, gazing at Yaz with a strange expression in her eyes.

Yaz smiled. “’Course.” she said, as confidently as she had said ‘Sure’ when she’d answered the Doctor’s ‘be sure’. It resulted in the same beaming grin. And the Doctor leaning in and pressing her lips to Yaz’s. Yaz jerked back in surprise, staring in shock at the Doctor, her mouth dropping open.

“Oh. Sorry.” The Doctor winced. “Thought we were acting out Shakespeare.” She scrunched her face up and swung her arms awkwardly, avoiding Yaz’s gaze.

Yaz expression changed to one of disbelief. “We’re not acting it out, Doctor. This isn’t a play.” Disappointment made her tone sharper than she wanted it to come out.

“No! Course not. Ha. I just thought…Stupid Doctor.”

“This is serious!”

That got the Doctor’s eyes locking with Yaz’s, searching for something, scrutinising every inch of Yaz’s soul, or so it felt to Yaz. She tried to keep herself still, as she would in a scanner, lest even the tiniest motion caused the picture blur and become impossible to draw any conclusions from. But the tension overcame her, and she broke the connection. “No. You’re not stupid. It’s my fault. I shouldn’t’ve quoted it.” Yaz shook her head, to emphasise her point, to dispel the feeling of being turned inside out. Distant sounds of gunfire sounded, breaking through the small bubble that had been made. Yaz readied herself to run after the Doctor, but the Timelord was still standing there, her eyes no longer penetrating beams but strangely blank.

“Did you want me to kiss you seriously then?” Her voice was as emotionless as her eyes, only a hint of weary resignation of the inevitable lifting it from being monotonous. There was a muffled thud and behind the Doctor, the door to the chapel splintered.

“You can kiss me later. Right now, aliens bent on conquering earth are about to break into the chapel!” Yaz pointed behind her.

“Yeah but that’s just appropriate isn’t it?” The Doctor shrugged, making her polite cat face. “You humans, in every disaster movie, whenever it’s really important and urgent to get on with something in order to save the world, you always stop for a kiss. Precious moments lost, just to express how precious someone is.”

Another thud and the hinges creaked and warped away from the door frame. “Doctor! It’s really, really not the time.” Yaz grabbed the Timelord’s arm, trying to drag her away, back to the broom cupboard or out to anywhere.

The Doctor merely swayed, moving not an inch from the spot. “Might not get another time. I can understand why they do it now. Something about life or death situations that make you feel all urgent, like things should be done now.” The Doctor smiled sadly. “Not that I ever…”

“Yes.” Yaz interrupted her. “Like hiding from marauding aliens!”

The hinges gave way at last, and the door crashed down, sending a wave of dust through the chapel. An entire platoon of the aliens came marching through it, the leader walking straight up to the Doctor.

“Oops. Too late now Yaz.” The Doctor gave her a sad smile as she raised her arms in surrender.

“What?” The platoon surrounded them now, the leader pointing his weapon directly at the Doctor’s bowed head. Something snapped within Yasmin Khan at that image. Anguish changed its last four letters and became anger. “What d’you mean? Too late?” She shouted at the Doctor, as she stomped past her marching up to the leader, the lack of surrender taking him by surprise and allowing her to yank his weapon out of his hands. She pointed it at him and fired, shooting his helmet off. Twenty guns were now trained on her, but she didn’t care. Besides she had one gun trained on the leader. Time to play chicken. “No.” she said, uncertain what or who she was saying it to.

The Doctor was about to say something when the first sounds of Big Ben striking midnight rang in the distance. The Doctor perked up immediately. “Aw brilliant. My fam, always comes through, even if they do cut it a bit fine. Yaz!” she tugged the gun out of Yaz’s hand, throwing it to the ground. Then she grasped Yaz’s head, covering Yaz’s ears with her hands, and Yaz’s lips with her own.

Yaz was dimly aware of the bongs increasing in volume, she could feel them vibrating the floor, or was she just vibrating herself? It was hard to concentrate on anything really, while the Doctor was kissing her. And then it was gone. Chimed midnight and that was that. She opened her ears as the Doctor released her and looked round to find the entire platoon lying on the floor. A strange orange mucus was leaking from the leader’s ears.

“What?” she said, for what felt like the thousandth time that day.

“Funny thing about the Dirklyons. Most noisy creatures in the universe sometimes, but when they hear certain pitches, they just completely melt down. Can’t handle it. That’s why they wear the helmets. Of course, a certain amazing someone just up and shot it right off.”

“But only off the leader. Why did the others…”

“Because they communicate through these little ear pieces.” The Doctor pointed to what looked remarkably like a hands-free kit. “There’s a microphone too, see. Brilliant system. Just like your standard headset. And it works fine, unless the channel is open when one of them isn’t wearing their helmet and a massive great big really recognisable noise which has been adjusted by sonic screwdriver to be the precise pitch that they can’t handle, suddenly tolls through the night. Would’ve stunned them enough with the helmet off, but…well.” The Doctor gestured around her, just as another platoon of heavily armed soldiers burst through the door. “Ah! This could be awkward.”

“They’re human.”

“Believe me, that never makes it any less awkward. Although at least it’s UNIT. Old…uh… friends.” The Doctor raised her hands in the air again.

“Well then they’ll know you.”

“Different face Yaz! Not to mention entirely different gender.”

A tall lady with blonde hair in a cut not too dissimilar to the Doctor’s strode towards them from the masses of soldiers.

“Take care of the aliens.” She said.

Yaz was impressed. Her voice wasn’t raised, she didn’t bark the order, but her tone was commanding, and every single soldier started restraining the unconscious aliens and dragging them out. That kind of voice would be brilliant working in the police force. It could probably get criminals to confess in an instant, or mardy men fighting outside pubs to start sweeping up the glass they’d broken.

“Kate Lethbridge-Stewart.” The Doctor smiled as the lady approached.

“Doctor.”

“Oh good. You recognise me. Yaz, meet Kate.”

“We’ve already met.” Kate nodded her head towards Yaz.

“Uhh…think I would’ve remembered.” Yaz gave a nervous grin.

“Black archive.” The Doctor sighed. “Thought I told you to stop doing that.”

“Yes.” Kate shrugged. “Loving the new look. The hair style especially. And piercings! Never thought of you as the piercings type.”

“I liked Yaz’s.”

That surprised Yaz. She knew the Doctor wanted piercings, had held her hand when she’d got them done but the Doctor hadn’t mentioned that it was because she’d liked Yaz’s own ones. Yaz self-consciously raised a hand and touched the pieces of metal in her right ear.

“Hm. Well, we’ve got everything under control here Doctor.”

“Doctor!” Graham and Ryan came running through the door, both of them jogging to a halt and bending double.

“Here.” Ryan passed the Doctor her screwdriver back. “Take it worked then. Saw a whole load of ‘em bein’ taken out.”

“Like a charm Ryan.”

“What will happen to them?” Graham asked. “I mean, you don’t like people killing things.”

“Oh, they’ll be packed off back to their spaceship and sent on their way.” Kate smiled at him. “Well, hope to see you again Doctor. In the usual circumstances, no doubt.”

“Right then, back to the TARDIS.” The Doctor took one last look around the chapel. “Oh! By the way, may have broken the doorknob on a famous broom cupboard.” She grinned at Kate and skipped towards the doorway. Graham, Ryan and Yaz waved at Kate and hastily followed her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> https://www.parliament.uk/about/living-heritage/transformingsociety/electionsvoting/womenvote/case-studies-women-parliament/ewd/tony-benn-plaque/
> 
> it's real


End file.
